Ya know what really grinds my gears?

[Kudistos Megistos]

Hollywood or other mainstream adaptations of games, anime, books or other works with a cult following that rape the spirit of the original and suggest a conscious effort to move away from the franchise's original fanbase.

I was reminded of this phenomenon by reading this article about a Hollywood adaptation of Bleach (NSFW), and there have been quite a few examples of Western adaptations of anime and manga that have deliberately ignored or tried to hide its origins (see the paperback version of the Haruhi light novel (original/hardback version here) and the Spice and Wolf light novel (NSFW)), but they do the same thing with other media as well.

There are quite a few things about this that piss me off:

Firstly, it's patronising. It suggests that things have to be changed because mainstream audiences/Westerners won't be able to cope with the original. Presumably we'll choke on our hamburgers if things aren't properly localised (possible NSFW ads). Don't people have any faith that mainstream audiences might like things more if they are left as they are? Interestingly, Pokemon were almost made into scary looking monsters for Western audiences, on the assumption that we wouldn't want anything "cute". IIRC, the cute Pokemon went on to be rather popular; when I was 12, I was (literally) the only person in my class at school who didn't collect Pokemon cards and battle with them every day. It seems that Pokemon did just fine without being patronisingly "localised".

Secondly, it's a slap in the face to the original fans. What the adaptors are saying is "You guys made this franchise what it is; it's popular because of you; because of you the creators aren't homeless and destitute and because of you we heard about it. However, you are no longer useful; we don't want you as fans any more. We want to hang out with the cool kids. Now f*** off".

Thirdly, if you don't want to appeal to a cult audience and make something culty, why adapt a cult classic? If you don't want to appeal to geeks and make something geeky, why adapt something geeky? If you don't want to appeal to weeaboos and make something that looks Japanese, why adapt an anime? Why not make something completely original? It seems that some people can't come up with any ideas of their own and instead adapt and rape an existing franchise until the only things left are the names and a very basic story/character outline. They want to appeal to a certain audience and make something in a certain genre but can't come up with their own ideas, so they take an existing product from a different genre and change it until it looks like it will appeal to the audience they want. FFS, either adapt something and stay faithful to the spirit of the original or make something completely new: do one or the other.

it should be noted that these kinds of adaptation are rarely critical or commercial successes. Most of the time, they get the same audience they would have got if they hadn't raped everything; the difference is that they have an audience of angry geeks who then write nasty things on the internet instead of an audience of happy geeks. As a rule, successful adaptations tend to be the more faithful ones.

[idl12]

i completly agree, just look at dragon ball z, i enjoyed every minute of that anime then all of a sudden they came out with this live action piece of crap that made me cry with disgust , what gives them the right to destroy the basis on which my childhood was built....sniff(clutches dbz remastered season one boxset)

[Cupcake]

i completly agree, just look at dragon ball z, i enjoyed every minute of that anime then all of a sudden they came out with this live action piece of crap that made me cry with disgust , what gives them the right to destroy the basis on which my childhood was built....sniff(clutches dbz remastered season one boxset)

I don't mean to threadjack this, because I agree that if you're a fan of something, and it gets the wrong treatment, it sucks.  I just want to ask one question.  Am I the only person on the face of the earth that doesn't like Dragon Ball Z in any form?

[Jari]

I don't mean to threadjack this, because I agree that if you're a fan of something, and it gets the wrong treatment, it sucks.  I just want to ask one question.  Am I the only person on the face of the earth that doesn't like Dragon Ball Z in any form?

No, you are not.

I might edit a reply to Kudistos into this space, later on - his poast certainly deserves a comment, but I'm bit too tired right now.

[Jaitsu]

i used to like DBZ, not any more, but i also saw the live action movie and while i thought it was good in its own way, i did not in any way enjoy all the changes. im just hoping they don't screw up the last airbender, bleach, or anything other then that.


lets just hope they NEVER get there hands on ff7

[titeguy3]

[rerail topic]

The root of the problem is that when entertainment becomes mainstream, it stops being an art and starts becoming a business. Imagine if Picasso or DaVinci were still alive and realized they were famous and started cranking out painting after painting just because they knew they would sell well. It would be utter sh*t. There would cease to be any soul or meaning to the paintings, it would all just be about making money. Sadly though, entertainment companies don't die so easily, and this ends up becoming the case to the extent that they'll even bastardize others' works.

There should be stronger monopoly laws against the entertainment industry to avoid crap like this.

Better yet--legalize filesharing. That'll solve the problem; once something goes big enough mainstream it'll stop turning a profit, paving the way for new artists to strut their stuff. (has been advocating the legalization of filesharing for a long time)

[yoshi314]

[rerail topic]

The root of the problem is that when entertainment becomes mainstream, it stops being an art and starts becoming a business. Imagine if Picasso or DaVinci were still alive and realized they were famous and started cranking out painting after painting just because they knew they would sell well. It would be utter sh*t. There would cease to be any soul or meaning to the paintings, it would all just be about making money. Sadly though, entertainment companies don't die so easily, and this ends up becoming the case to the extent that they'll even bastardize others' works.

that's the best summary of that problem i've seen so far. going into quantity kills the quality. i can agree about that.

Better yet--legalize filesharing. That'll solve the problem; once something goes big enough mainstream it'll stop turning a profit, paving the way for new artists to strut their stuff. (has been advocating the legalization of filesharing for a long time)

maybe not legalize all filesharing. but trying to accept it and promote one's works this way might work. and killing off mainstream is not good, too.

companies are greedy by nature. soon it will be impossible to buy second hand games, thanks to digital downloads. just because they think it's cheating.

[idl12]

i completly agree, just look at dragon ball z, i enjoyed every minute of that anime then all of a sudden they came out with this live action piece of crap that made me cry with disgust , what gives them the right to destroy the basis on which my childhood was built....sniff(clutches dbz remastered season one boxset)

I don't mean to threadjack this, because I agree that if you're a fan of something, and it gets the wrong treatment, it sucks.  I just want to ask one question.  Am I the only person on the face of the earth that doesn't like Dragon Ball Z in any form?

you know, it's funny how eveyone claims they hate dbz so much, i've heard claims of lack of originality/story and whatnot, but they fail to see that dbz it THE original, just about every anime that people falsely calim is better than it has borrowed more than a few aspects from dbz, just look at everyone's favorite naruto "cough" worst show in the world, the amount of content they borrowed from dbz is quite extensive. As for the story, other animes tend to have a real world setting but dbz creates it's own extensive universe, lots of people like me really love that idea hence the reason dbz and gurren lagann to me are the best animes ever made oh, and lets not forget how awesome every single fight was(i mean they took two years to beat one guy) I guess in my opinion, if you've watched a show when you were 8 and found it awesome and can come back at 16 and still say the same thing, it's really a treasure and Hollywood has already destroyed dbz, i'll kill them all if they touch Gurren lagann. I suppose every one has their opinion though, just wanted to clear this up( in the nicest way possible.)

[titeguy3]

you know, it's funny how eveyone claims they hate dbz so much, i've heard claims of lack of originality/story and whatnot, but they fail to see that dbz it THE original, just about every anime that people falsely calim is better than it has borrowed more than a few aspects from dbz, just look at everyone's favorite naruto "cough" worst show in the world, the amount of content they borrowed from dbz is quite extensive. As for the story, other animes tend to have a real world setting but dbz creates it's own extensive universe, lots of people like me really love that idea hence the reason dbz and gurren lagann to me are the best animes ever made oh, and lets not forget how awesome every single fight was(i mean they took two years to beat one guy) I guess in my opinion, if you've watched a show when you were 8 and found it awesome and can come back at 16 and still say the same thing, it's really a treasure and Hollywood has already destroyed dbz, i'll kill them all if they touch Gurren lagann. I suppose every one has their opinion though, just wanted to clear this up( in the nicest way possible.)

Guren Lagann was an amazing experience. If you were make a graph of the character progression over time in that anime, it'd be like y=x^(over 9000). It's absurd. I give most anime credit and I like DBZ, it's what raised me, although I'll admit that the voice actors they used for the original Japanese version were atrocious! Luckily Funimation didn't completely eff up the English dubbing.

Better yet--legalize filesharing. That'll solve the problem; once something goes big enough mainstream it'll stop turning a profit, paving the way for new artists to strut their stuff. (has been advocating the legalization of filesharing for a long time)

maybe not legalize all filesharing. but trying to accept it and promote one's works this way might work. and killing off mainstream is not good, too.

companies are greedy by nature. soon it will be impossible to buy second hand games, thanks to digital downloads. just because they think it's cheating.

Aim for the stars and you'll make it to the sky, my friend. Filesharing has been under a lot of political/judicial debate ever since the Pirate Bay fiasco. It was even recently deemed legal in a Spanish Court. The only reason that people are supposed to think that filesharing is immoral is because the Entertainment industry doesn't like it, and when powerful industry doesn't like something, they sue the pants off of it and/or try to brainwash people into thinking that it's bad. Case and point marijuana, which kills fewer people than cigarettes or alcohol. And again with free healthcare. And again with fan-remakes of games like Chrono Trigger: Resurrection. And again with game console emulators. And--well..you get the point.

It's only a matter of time before entertainment industries inevitably lose the fight against technological progression. They're not fighting any specific individuals, they're trying to fight the times. And that doesn't work, you just have to learn to accept change, and adhere your strategy to work around it.

[Bosola]

The Chrono Project should have seen it coming. What the hell did they expect?

[Timu Sumisu]

i do beleive the chrono ressurection project was a tech demo by a starting game company to show themselves off.

[Cupcake]

i do beleive the chrono ressurection project was a tech demo by a starting game company to show themselves off.

It was

i completly agree, just look at dragon ball z, i enjoyed every minute of that anime then all of a sudden they came out with this live action piece of crap that made me cry with disgust , what gives them the right to destroy the basis on which my childhood was built....sniff(clutches dbz remastered season one boxset)

I don't mean to threadjack this, because I agree that if you're a fan of something, and it gets the wrong treatment, it sucks.  I just want to ask one question.  Am I the only person on the face of the earth that doesn't like Dragon Ball Z in any form?

you know, it's funny how eveyone claims they hate dbz so much, i've heard claims of lack of originality/story and whatnot, but they fail to see that dbz it THE original, just about every anime that people falsely calim is better than it has borrowed more than a few aspects from dbz, just look at everyone's favorite naruto "cough" worst show in the world, the amount of content they borrowed from dbz is quite extensive. As for the story, other animes tend to have a real world setting but dbz creates it's own extensive universe, lots of people like me really love that idea hence the reason dbz and gurren lagann to me are the best animes ever made oh, and lets not forget how awesome every single fight was(i mean they took two years to beat one guy) I guess in my opinion, if you've watched a show when you were 8 and found it awesome and can come back at 16 and still say the same thing, it's really a treasure and Hollywood has already destroyed dbz, i'll kill them all if they touch Gurren lagann. I suppose every one has their opinion though, just wanted to clear this up( in the nicest way possible.)

I just don't like anime =p

Except .Hack//SIGN
...or FF VII if Herbie is to be believed

[sithlord48]

It's only a matter of time before entertainment industries inevitably lose the fight against technological progression. They're not fighting any specific individuals, they're trying to fight the times. And that doesn't work, you just have to learn to accept change, and adhere your strategy to work around it.

the first thing that had the riaa's panties in a bunch was the Player Piano. they used to sell sheet music, and the player paino was gonna bankrupt them because people no longer needed to buy sheet music, as you can see they have adjusted just fine since then. big companys will never stop bitching about all the monies that they don't make because of "pirates" . the mpaa is a great example of this they say there sales are down alot , but not cause they make crappy movies that no one wants to see, but because people dl the movies.. idk about u guys but i don't go to the movies unless i accually want to see something and every time i go what ever i went to see SUCKED. and besides for the cost of a ticket i could rent the movie a bunch of time. the riaa is no better they love to sue and sue again. people don't buy cd's cause they can dl them.. no its more like people don't buy cd's for a good song (when a cd cost ~20 dollars). i for one think the riaa should be disbanded and the music give back to the artists who create it. i found this cool page showing the history of the music biz. look at 1900

The U.S. Supreme Court delivers a blow to the music publishers by declaring that copyrights will only protect those songs that can be read by the human eye -- thus exempting piano rolls and other machine-produced music products

oh well i see that didn't last all to long cause it looks like congress passed a law almost right after that judgement forcing royalites for any reproduction of music..

now look at what happened in 1992.

The Audio Home Recording Act of 1992 requires manufacturers of digital recorders to pay a 2 percent royalty rate to copyright holders to compensate for the ease of piracy that digital recording allows. In addition, digital audio recording devices are required to include a device that prohibits serial copying.

  wtf.  now you may ask what is the point of this rant. the point is that they will continue to use their money to influance the people who make the laws. and use those laws to be sure that were all up to good things at home.. now i will stop before i get on about microsoft...